Kumon/ Kip McGrath etc Maths. Any good? 7 yr old, Y3 struggling!

[kayspace]

I never thought I'd get into tutoring but I am wondering whether my DS's maths MIGHT get the boost it needs from some 'extra'? His teacher is lovely and always accentuates the positive- which is nice BUT if DS is getting 5/15 for maths 'exams' (ie an overview test of Y3 to date) I think I may need to step things up a bit! He won't take learning from me AND frankly I suspect I'd confuse him as I'm old school.

Have you had any experience of this type of tutoring?

Any hints/tips?

We did Kumon for a while (ds English, dd maths). It was for ds, really, he needed regular writing practice to get over a block he had in picking up a pencil at all.

What I would say, some years on, is that if what you are sure your child needs is steady drills (piano practice version of numeracy) and it is easier to keep that going with outside structure, then it can be worth doing. But it is really expensive.

If your DS needs extra help get a proper tutor who will tutor him according to his needs. Kumon is a franchise run by anyone who pays and doesn't need to be qualified - and its pricey. Everyone does the same thing -it would be more helpful to address his specific areas which might be nothing but confidence.
I have taught children who have done Kumon aswell and it only seems to have confued them in class rather than help.

Depends also what areas he's having difficulties with. Kumon are quite good for drilling children in basic rules of arithmetic (though you spend a long time doing adding before they move on to subtraction, and then a long time subtracting etc). If you have a child who finds it hard to extrapolate their arithmetic knowledge to eg. problems, then Kumon will not help much, if at all.

As Bink says, it's jolly expensive for what it it, though they are good at motivating the children (lots of stickers etc). They don't really teach the children at all, they just start off with very easy stuff and move up v. slowly and incrementally. It is extremely dull for all concerned.

For a fraction of the price you could buy a bunch of workbooks from Smiths or Waterstones and work through them. Or even consider one-to-one tutoring for an hour a week, which doesn't work out a that much more when you take holidays into account, and you get tailored one-to-one help rather than a rip-off franchise.

Oh - the other thing I meant to say is that nowadays the web is stuffed with primary maths practice sites, which give you just about all the steady incremental over-and-over practice you could want - and so the Kumon structure thing is much less of a selling point than it would have been 10 years ago.

Ask your son's school? - all schools like these now.

Thanks all!

I was going to ask: what do people think of over-the-counter workbooks? Like the Schofield and Sims ones?

Any recommendations?

I admit that I only know one boy who does Kumon and he was already WELL ahead of the game in maths before he started so I can't really say it's helped him, though his mother swears by it!

Dedicated Kumon family here at the Uptomyeyes house. DS1 has been at it for 3 years and it has transformed him. I knew he would benefit from a structured system and frankly I don't have the time to go searching the net or WHSMith to find other "cheaper" resources. It offers consistency and practise. DS2 is yr 2 age 7 yo. he started about 10 months ago. I wouldn't be too bothered if he gave up, but he has an expectation that he will do Kumon because his brother does. I get very little complaint, it takes about 20mins each per evening. I spoke to DS1's headmistress this morning about in fact and she said it can be very effective for children struggling with basic arithmetic. I could honestly say now that DS1 has gone from bottom of the year to the top in 3 years. his basic arithmatic is fab, though problem solving is a weakness that school are working on with him. Our "rip-off franchaisees" are a lovely couple who have been running our centre for over 20 years and are exceptionally motivating and just all round lovely

I agree with Bink there is alot of online FREE stuff which is perfectly good - doesn't have to be inferior if it doesn't cost as much - will withold personal opinions here for the sake of the thread - if you google maths games there are a lot of fun sites which use maths in fun interewsting and relevant ways and use problem solving questions so the application is there too. it isn't much use having great calculation skills if you can't apply them - a calcualtor has great calculation skills and everyone has access to them these days. A good skill to learnis to be able to do and use maths properly.

interesting - as you can see I teach Maths not English !!!

tHERE WAS A BIG THREAD ABOUT kIP mCgRATH LAST WEEK, MIGHT BE WORTH SEARCHING FOR IT. Sorry didn't mean to shout!

DD goes to Kip and I think its really good.

Thanks again to all.

I'm not sure WHAT type of learner DS2 is! Bit of an enigma, really. I do think he does better when he's 'told' to do something by someone external to the family eg a teacher but this is a 'learned' thing as DS1 (9) WILL NOT TAKE TELLING! ie I can't help him with HIS homework at all as it ends up being flung around the house- til he realises that I'm SERIOUS that I WILL tell his teacher than 'x' hasn't done his homework despite ample encouragement and offers of help..! THEN I get the sheepish polite request for assistance!!

DS2 has observed this way of carrying on and is doing it too!

I think what I will try is getting a couple of work books and being absolutely dedicated to the task for a month or 2 and see where we go from there. Fitting extra tutoring into our lives would be tricky at best because of my irregular work hours.

I had a problem with DS being 'allergic' to writing, but i realised i had to do something. It was terrible at first and I wasn't sure i could put up with the trouble, but we just stuck at it - it was a nightmare practising writing everyday but eventually it got through and his writing did improve i.e. he realised he needed to make an effort with it at school if he was to get out of doing it everyday at home!!
Its worth it but a nightmare in the 'breaking them down stage' lots of tantrums, screaming etc..............................and my DS was quite badly behaved too

Did you pick the same time every day as far as poss or did you try to pick your moments?

kayspace - I had the same problem with my ds and he had big issues with me helping him, mainly because they teach it so differently these days ("chunking" instead of adding up in columns? ). Every time I showed him how to do something, the response would be "that's not how Miss shows us at school"!

After struggling along for a while, I rang a local tutor agency and asked for a tutor who would build up his confidence and knew how they teach the current curriculum in state schools. They sent a fabulous tutor who is a supply teacher in local schools and he did a great job. My DS will never be a maths genius, but he is now doing well on tests and, more importantly, thinks he is good at maths.

We started with the tutor in Y4, but to be honest I feel I should have started earlier. We did a little Kumon, but the problem was not repetition and practice, the fact was that he needed things explained to him in a calm and supportive way until it finally "clicked" in his brain.

HTH and good luck!

There was a thread of Kip McGrath recently

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/education/677000-Kumon-or-private-tutor?reverse=1

My son goes to Kip McGrath and there are typically 5 children in the class with two qualified teachers. Each session lasts 1 hour and 2 minutes and some of the time the children work independently on work sheets or computer activites and some of the session they get one to one with a teacher.

The nice thing is that its tailored to the indivdual child. For example I can request that the Kip McGrath teacher explains to my son how to draw a bar chart because he doesn't understand his homework.

The general consensus seems to be that Private tutoring is better than Kumon, right? I have worked it out and Kumon would only be cheaper by approx £18 but still I don't want to make the wrong choice especially as I am in this for the long term and it could end up being a costly mistake!

i have been thinking about khe kumon/kip AS DS 7 IS REALLY STRUGGLING WITH ENGLISH.

I HAVE A FREE 1 HR CONSULTAITON WITH THEM TOMORROW. (NOT THE BEST WAY TO CELEBRATE VALENTINES dAY - HOWEVER HE IS THE LOVE OF MY LIFE LOL) opps so sorry for caps.

will let you know how i get on.

had another meeting with the senco at the school friday and she did some amazing tests and has pointed out the problems.

will see if they say the same thing. if i like it am going to give it a go for a while to see if he gets anything from it.

good luck

We did Kumon, Maths and English for a year and a half. It is hard work for the children, doing it every day. Initially, it helped a lot with dd basic arithmetic and especially with her spelling, grammar and comprehention. However, the maths program is not enough, my dd was struggling at school with problem solving etc... She needed to start times and tables at school, but Kumon kept sending her back to three figure addition and subtraction for silly errors and just because she has finished in 15min, instead of 10. The same with her English, she was made to repeat months of one and the same text and spelling, althought she was bored with it and knew it by heart.My pleads with the cource leader did not help as this was "The essence of Kumon" I moved to Kip McGrath, she was assessed as working a year ahead for her age, and I could not believe my eyes when I saw her first homework! Dd is working on level3 KS1 for SATS, but they have given her reception type phonics for reading, and what is 1 less than 230. I sent a very disaproving email but haven't heard from him yet,I had to prepare Dd for exam fot7+entry and Kumon was only waisting her time, I got lots of Bond bookd, Mega maths book ans Scoffield and Simms.That helped, she was offerd a scollsrship. So naw, I am going to insist that Kip give her the work she heeds. If not, I will just work with the books tht we have and resume Kumon for practice during the summer

also things do fall into place as they get older, myoldest is now 10 and does much better than he ever did at 7. i took heart from my old school reports which showed me tobe exactly like that. at 7 i was a dunce at maths, but by 11/12 top of the class with no tutoring...took me a few years to actually listen and stop dreaming in class

The books from smiths are good as a reference guide to check that you are covering the right material. However, I do find that they do not give enough questions to practice on. What I would suggest is to buy the books, and print off or make up extra questions on the topics covered on each page.

I find it hard to teach my own child and have been sending my son to Kip for about a month now. They are real experts in teaching and I can already see the difference. he only goes once a week and it fits in with my busy lifestyle. It is costly, but what you get is what you pay for. At the end of the day I have peace of mind that he is learning something in a positive way.

Hi there

I must agree- What you get is what you pay for. My son recently sat entrance exams for senior school and passed with flying colours for maths and English. I couldn't have done it without Kip McGrath- as the centre owner is a teacher with experience it really made a difference to understanding skills and getting it through to DR. Kumon wasted valuable time.

just wanted to reccommend maths-whizz. good value, great fun and suited to their ability level in each different area. its a computer based maths tutoring service and its got fab/fun graphics. my sons addicted.

www.whizz.com/#